Paint Creek Watershed showing signs of life

October 09, 2009|By DAN DiPAOLO, Daily American 30 North Chief

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WINDBER — Every year more than 4,000 tons of acidity-raising material and 500 tons of iron and aluminum byproducts find their way into the Stonycreek River from the Paint Creek Watershed, mostly the result of decades of surface and deep coal mining.

The watershed itself consists of approximately 62 miles of stream in a 38-square-mile area. Many sections of stream have been flooded with acid mine drainage (AMD), which in some cases has gone untreated for years and has reduced the worst areas to zones devoid of aquatic life.

In fact, water quality testing has shown areas with pH levels in the 2.9 range, which is comparable to battery acid. Healthy streams have ratings between 5 and 8, which means that the acid-to-base ratio is relatively balanced.

But the situation is on the cusp of positive change with two large state-mandated AMD remediation sites about to go online later this year and a grant for another in the funding cycle, according the water and environmental experts who attended the Somerset County Watershed Summit on Thursday.

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“There are still some very nice places along Paint Creek,” said Tom Clark, an AMD remediation expert working for the Susquehanna River Basin Commission. “You can see this area once held a vast population of brook trout. There’s hope we can restore that.”

More than 40 people — including representatives of the Department of Environmental Protection, local and county officials — attended the daylong summit, which included presentations and a tour of the watershed’s two AMD treatment sites set up by Cooney Brothers Coal Co. of Cresson.

The treatment sites represent a huge step forward for AMD remediation efforts in the region and have the potential to reduce some of the worst pollution into watershed areas like Babcock Creek by a significant percentage, Clark said.

A watershed assessment commissioned by the Paint Creek Regional Watershed Association identified 18 major AMD discharges into those streams and came up with a plan to remediate nine.

“There’s a lot of good that can be done on Paint Creek (watershed) on the cheap,” Clark said.

If funding can be found for the plan, the overall reduction in pollution could exceed 50 percent and give residents a chance to see fish and aquatic life populations rise to levels that haven’t been seen since coal began coming out of the hills in the early 1900s.

The work beginning now at the headwaters of the watershed is key to its overall future health. Driving along the scrub-filled reclaimed surface mine areas near Babcock Creek offers a technicolor view of the destruction.

Coal refuse piles still loom over the landscape, rough drainage ditches are cut into the hillsides and dozens of passive treatment ponds contain water stained with the burnt-orange of AMD. The vans also passed sections of tree stumps still sitting in brackish water as the hills flashed orange and red and green around them.

The problem is particularly bad in those sections because the coal mined from that area came from the Brookville and Mercer coal seams, which are high in sulfur content.

Add water to sulfur — and this is not a dry area — and you get sulfuric acid running into the streams, Clark said.

The two treatment sites include rectangular silos capable of holding more than 40 tons of pebbled limestone. They are designed to treat and reduce the acidity of more than 200 gallons of water per minute, releasing it into the passive treatment ponds where undesirable solids like iron and aluminum will precipitate out of the water as it works its way back into the native streams.

Rich Wargo, president of the association, said that while the treatment sites are a start, the public must stay actively involved in order to keep funds coming.

“We still have a lot to do. And there’s a lot that can be done if people take the time to come out and show interest like they have today,” he said.